Sally Greek Hitchcock's story

We were at the family homestead, mile 107 Glenn Hgy, with Jim coming back across the branch of the Matanuska at the end of the property on the D-2 Cat, and Herman Hebsh of Bonnie Lake working around the sawmill. I was in the two-story cabin with a bowl of leftover spaghetti in "Matilda" the little white wood cook store, girls in the far corner of the front room in the big book-reading chair.

The noise of all the shelves in the hall unloading groceries — coffee grounds and strawberry jam together — was drowned by a bookshelf unloading between me and the girls. In the front corner the kerosene lamp on the sewing machine moved back and forth without spilling. I grabbed a 2 and 5 year old girl under each arm, and waded through the groceries to the back door, where Herman had just arrived and we listened to Jim's cross country foot steps were getting closer and closer as he cover the old meadow like he ran in High School.

We checked stuff, noticed the hot smell of rock that I called brimstone, saw the trees still touching tops as needles fell around us. The cat was still running, our electric system strung in the trees was still up, but supper was ruined, and I can't really remember what, or of we ate before we took Herman home to see how Bonnie was. The road commission had cleared off the road in many spots, and flagged stuff they couldn't move or patch on the way to Bonnie Lake turn off. The men rode the snowmachine into the cabin, and we sat on a rise between two puddles as the pickup moved with every after shock, and the three of us (Kate was born in December) were stuffed into old army sleeping bags. Holding on tight.

It was maybe two years later that I stopped putting shoes and glasses ready to jump out of bed and run. We were at my folks in Michigan and I threw the shoes across the room and never put them out again.

Sally Greek Hitchcock lives in Palmer.